Do you spend more time thinking about the future or the past? Why?
Do you spend more time thinking about the future or the past? Why?
The truth is, I do both but not for the reasons people usually assume.
I don’t live in the past because I want to stay there. I go back because parts of it still speak to me. Grief doesn’t disappear just because time moves forward. Some memories still ask to be acknowledged, especially the ones tied to loss, abandonment, and moments where I had to grow up faster than I should have. I don’t revisit the past to punish myself I revisit it to understand it, to honor what shaped me, and to make peace with what never got closure.
At the same time, I spend a lot of time thinking about the future. Not because I’m avoiding the present, but because building something meaningful gives my pain a purpose. I think ahead in terms of impact, structure, legacy, and correction. I imagine a future that looks different from what I was given a future where what I endured turns into something that helps someone else breathe easier.
If I’m being honest, I feel in the past. That’s where the emotions live and the memories, the ache, the unanswered questions. I think in the future. That’s where strategy, planning, and vision live. And I function in the present. That’s where responsibility lives. That’s where I show up, get things done, and keep going even when I’m tired.
Holding all three at once is exhausting.
People say “just live in the moment” as if it’s simple. For me, the present is where I have to carry what I remember and what I’m trying to build at the same time. The past still asks to be honored. The future still asks to be created. And the present doesn’t pause long enough for me to put either one down.
What I’m really working on isn’t choosing between the past or the future. It’s learning how to loosen my grip on the belief that I always have to be carrying something to be worthy. That rest means failure. That pausing means forgetting where I came from or giving up on where I’m going.
I don’t want to erase the past. I don’t want to abandon the future. I want to live in a present where I can breathe without guilt where I can exist without constantly proving that my pain meant something.
That’s the balance I’m learning.
Not letting go of who I was or who I’m becoming
but allowing myself to be who I am, right now.
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